There’s a bag of lettuce in your refrigerator right now, and you might be surprised by how strange its life has been. It most likely began in soil that was nourished by nitrogen extracted from natural gas in the Salinas Valley of California. It was cut by a diesel harvester. It was transported over the majority of a continent by a diesel truck. Petroleum was also used to make the plastic film that kept it crisp. If you go back far enough, lettuce is essentially refined oil that has learned to be environmentally friendly. Additionally, oil is currently embroiled in a conflict.
Most people miss that part. Gas prices made headlines this spring when the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow stretch of water that most Americans couldn’t find on a map, was effectively closed to commercial traffic. Reasonable enough. However, the more intriguing story was taking place in the produce section one aisle over, and it moved more slowly, which may be why no one was yelling about it.
This is the item that no one actually priced in. Approximately one-third of the world’s seaborne fertilizer and one-fifth of the natural gas used to make fertilizer travel through that strait. It wasn’t just tankers sitting idle when traffic fell off a cliff, with transits falling by over 90% in just a few weeks. Stuck, it served as the raw material for the crops of the following season. Suddenly, farmers in Brazil, India, and some parts of Europe were looking at fertilizer that they couldn’t afford or obtain. At the pump, you don’t sense that. Months later, you can feel it in a tomato.
The diesel number is almost cartoonish, which is why I keep returning to it. In just one week, the U.S. average increased by roughly 96 cents, marking the largest weekly change since the government began recording that data in 1994. It powers every refrigerated truck on every highway. Thus, the cost of transporting food increased concurrently with the cost of cultivating it. The same cart, two squeezes.
The worst might not come to pass. A ceasefire and the reopening of the strait have been discussed, but expectations have diminished. However, fuel analysts continue to point out an unsettling fact: prices don’t simply return when shipping resumes. There is a memory in supply chains. It takes months for a field to receive fertilizer, for that field to produce, and for that production to be stored on a shelf. The lag is reciprocal.
Watching this gives me the impression that we have subtly recreated the same vulnerability that we promised to address following the grain shock in Ukraine a few years ago. A chokepoint, panic, hoarding, speculation, and the poorest nations being hit first and hardest are all part of the same playbook. According to reports, more than half of Sudan’s fertilizer comes from the Gulf. Pakistan, about 25%. A distant street is not at all abstract to a family that is already missing a meal.
What about the rest of us? We’ll complain at the register, point the finger at the retailer, and perhaps change brands. The majority won’t make the connection to a waterway located south of Iran. Given how far the line extends and how few of us are looking at it, it’s difficult not to find that a little unsettling.
FAQ’s
Q: What is the Strait of Hormuz, and why does it matter for food?
It’s a narrow Gulf waterway carrying about a third of the world’s seaborne fertilizer and a fifth of its LNG, so when it closes, the raw materials for growing food get stuck.
Q: Why are grocery prices rising if this is an oil conflict?
Because food is essentially a petroleum product — fertilizer comes from natural gas, and diesel powers the harvesting and trucking that gets it to your shelf.
Q: How bad was the fuel spike?
U.S. retail diesel jumped roughly 96 cents in a single week, the largest weekly increase since record-keeping began in 1994.
Q: When will prices come back down?
Even if the strait reopens, prices likely won’t snap back quickly, since fertilizer and crops move on a months-long lag.
Q: Who gets hit hardest?
Import-reliant nations like Sudan and Pakistan feel it first and worst, but anyone who buys groceries will notice it eventually.
